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Dashboard (software)
Encyclopedia
Dashboard is an application for Apple's Mac OS X
operating systems, used for hosting mini-applications known as widgets
. First introduced in Tiger
, it is a semi-transparent layer that is invisible to the user unless activated by clicking its icon in the Dock. Alternatively, the user can invoke Dashboard by moving the cursor into a preassigned hot corner, by pressing a hot key, or mouse button, any of which can be set to the user's preference.
When Dashboard is activated, the user's desktop is dimmed and widgets appear in the foreground. Like application windows, they can be moved around, rearranged, deleted, and recreated (so that more than one of the same Widget is open at the same time, possibly with different settings). New widgets can be opened, via an icon bar on the bottom of the layer, by dragging a widget icon out into the layer. After loading, the widget is ready for use.
Starting with OS X 10.7 "Lion", the Dashboard is a Space, accessed by swiping three fingers to the right.
(CSS) and JavaScript
. Because the same languages are used for creating websites, many web developers
can already build them. Widgets themselves are, at the core, simply HTML files that are displayed within the Dashboard layer; they use the WebKit
application framework that is also used in Apple's Safari
web browser, meaning even users running earlier versions of Mac OS X — where Dashboard is unavailable — can build them.
When a Dashboard widget is built, it usually consists of six files:
Once all of these files are in the root of a directory, it is given a name and the extension ".wdgt", and then it can be opened up in Dashboard as a widget. More complex widgets may also include a Cocoa widget plugin (for platform-specific functionality), one or more JavaScript files (for text scrolling, preferences, etc.) or multiple images (for personalized select menus or buttons).
Mac OS X v10.5
"Leopard" includes an application called Dashcode
, which is a more user-friendly way of creating widgets. Another new feature of Mac OS X Leopard is called "Web Clips" which lets users easily create widgets from parts of a webpage. During the WWDC 2007 keynote, Steve Jobs made widgets out of the following: the featured news headlines on Yahoo.com
, the top ten most searched terms on Google
, the Photo of the Day on National Geographic, the Dilbert
comic strip, and the box office information from Rotten Tomatoes
. The user can also customize the border to further personalize the widgets.
Search widget, which simply opens up the user's browser and performs a Google search. Other widgets, like Wikipedia, grab the contents of web pages and display them within Dashboard. Some widgets can also serve as games, using Adobe Flash
(or another multimedia authoring program) to create games just as if they were in a browser. It is also possible for Mac users to create their own widgets using built-in software.
These effects can be taxing and superfluous, consuming CPU resources, but with the help of OS X’s Quartz Extreme and Core Image
graphics architectures, sufficient computing power to render them in real time
is available. As with Exposé
, Front Row and the minimise effect, holding shift down while calling the Dashboard or opening the Dashboard menu bar will display the effect in slow motion
.
was in development. It was a subject of debate in the online community following the few months before Mac OS X Tiger's official release.
One school of thought came to the conclusion that Dashboard was a "rip-off" of Konfabulator. It points out the visual and functional similarities between Dashboard has been widely compared to Konfabulator (now Yahoo! Widget Engine
) and sometimes called a copy of it, due to the similarities between their graphical aspects and the fact that they both use the term “widgets” to describe the objects in their environments. Konfabulator may in turn have been based on Apple’s Desk Accessories
, first released in 1984 with the original Macintosh. Desk Accessories, similar to widgets, were small mini-applications that operated on a user’s desktop. After the introduction of System 7
and cooperative multitasking, the necessity of creating Desk Accessories was removed and developers were encouraged to create applications instead. The OS continued to support them, for backward compatibility, until the switch to Mac OS X
(In fact, the Calculator desk accessory remained in the Mac OS through version 9, 17 years without a significant update).
The code bases for Konfabulator and Dashboard are also different: Konfabulator uses XML
and JavaScript
to generate Widgets, whereas Dashboard uses HTML
, CSS
, JavaScript, and Objective-C
.
, Apple included 14 widgets with it. They consisted of:
After the Macworld 2006 keynote, Steve Jobs
also announced four new widgets (Ski Report, People Finder, Google Search, and ESPN), as well as significant updates to the Phone Book and Calendar widgets. All of these are available through the Mac OS X v10.4.4 update.
In addition, Mac OS X v10.5
"Leopard" released in late 2007, includes new widgets. One of these is Web Clips, which allows any user to turn a rectangular section of any webpage into a widget (This, however, only works with Safari
). The widget updates as the website does, and all links and other interactive material in the widget's selection of the webpage works as if the website is being accessed from Safari. Another new widget is Movies, which allows users to find currently playing movies at local theaters, view trailers, and purchase tickets directly from Dashboard.
and then restart the Dock (and Dashboard):
After the devmode has been set, widgets dragged from the Dashboard will remain floating on the desktop, even after log out or shutdown. With the Dashboard active, begin dragging a widget. While dragging the widget, press the keyboard key assigned to toggling Dashboard mode to close the dashboard. The widget will remain active and can be positioned. To move a desktop widget back to the Dashboard, simply reverse the process used to move it onto the desktop: drag the widget, then press the key to activate the Dashboard.
Another feature of the "devmode" is the ability to restart individual widgets. Pressing the Command-R keys will restart the active widget. This works whether a widget is in the Dashboard or not.
Another option is to use Amnesty Singles or Amnesty Widget Browser, shareware utilities that also allow the user to select which level (desktop, standard or floating) a widget occupies while it resides on the desktop. WidgetRunner is an open-source, freeware utility that also allows you to run widgets on the desktop and control the level at which they appear.
s, it is unknown if this most recent version of Dashcode would support the creation of AJAX-driven mobile widgets that could be installed natively on the iOS.
It has been demonstrated by Erica Sadun that installing Dashboard widgets on a jailbroken
iOS is possible in theory, but most desktop-oriented widgets 1) are not oriented to usage or interaction on the iOS's multi-touch
screen
-oriented interface; and 2) rely on DashboardClient's widget JavaScript object, which is not part of the iOS.
Mac OS X
Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...
operating systems, used for hosting mini-applications known as widgets
Widget engine
In computer software, a widget engine is a software service available to users for running and displaying applets on a graphical user interface, such as that of the desktop.The widget model in widget engines is attractive because of ease of development...
. First introduced in Tiger
Mac OS X v10.4
Mac OS X v10.4 Tiger is the fifth major release of Mac OS X, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers. Tiger was released to the public on 29 April 2005 for US$129.95 as the successor to Mac OS X Panther , which had been released 18 months earlier...
, it is a semi-transparent layer that is invisible to the user unless activated by clicking its icon in the Dock. Alternatively, the user can invoke Dashboard by moving the cursor into a preassigned hot corner, by pressing a hot key, or mouse button, any of which can be set to the user's preference.
When Dashboard is activated, the user's desktop is dimmed and widgets appear in the foreground. Like application windows, they can be moved around, rearranged, deleted, and recreated (so that more than one of the same Widget is open at the same time, possibly with different settings). New widgets can be opened, via an icon bar on the bottom of the layer, by dragging a widget icon out into the layer. After loading, the widget is ready for use.
Starting with OS X 10.7 "Lion", the Dashboard is a Space, accessed by swiping three fingers to the right.
Creation of widgets
Dashboard widgets are created using Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), Cascading Style SheetsCascading Style Sheets
Cascading Style Sheets is a style sheet language used to describe the presentation semantics of a document written in a markup language...
(CSS) and JavaScript
JavaScript
JavaScript is a prototype-based scripting language that is dynamic, weakly typed and has first-class functions. It is a multi-paradigm language, supporting object-oriented, imperative, and functional programming styles....
. Because the same languages are used for creating websites, many web developers
Software developer
A software developer is a person concerned with facets of the software development process. Their work includes researching, designing, developing, and testing software. A software developer may take part in design, computer programming, or software project management...
can already build them. Widgets themselves are, at the core, simply HTML files that are displayed within the Dashboard layer; they use the WebKit
WebKit
WebKit is a layout engine designed to allow web browsers to render web pages. WebKit powers Google Chrome and Apple Safari and by October 2011 held over 33% of the browser market share between them. It is also used as the basis for the experimental browser included with the Amazon Kindle ebook...
application framework that is also used in Apple's Safari
Safari (web browser)
Safari is a web browser developed by Apple Inc. and included with the Mac OS X and iOS operating systems. First released as a public beta on January 7, 2003 on the company's Mac OS X operating system, it became Apple's default browser beginning with Mac OS X v10.3 "Panther". Safari is also the...
web browser, meaning even users running earlier versions of Mac OS X — where Dashboard is unavailable — can build them.
When a Dashboard widget is built, it usually consists of six files:
- The widget's HTML file, which is the actual file that will be displayed in the Dashboard layer
- The widget's CSS file, which is used for styling the widget (but is called on from the HTML file)
- The widget's JavaScript file, although it may be implemented directly within the HTML file if the developer desires
- The widget's Property List (called “Info.plist”), which is what Dashboard uses to load the widget’s properties (i.e.: name, version, HTML file, etc.)
- The background image of the widget, in PNG format
- The iconIconAn icon is a religious work of art, most commonly a painting, from Eastern Christianity and in certain Eastern Catholic churches...
that is displayed in the menu bar
Once all of these files are in the root of a directory, it is given a name and the extension ".wdgt", and then it can be opened up in Dashboard as a widget. More complex widgets may also include a Cocoa widget plugin (for platform-specific functionality), one or more JavaScript files (for text scrolling, preferences, etc.) or multiple images (for personalized select menus or buttons).
Mac OS X v10.5
Mac OS X v10.5
Mac OS X Leopard is the sixth major release of Mac OS X, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers. Leopard was released on 26 October 2007 as the successor of Tiger , and is available in two variants: a desktop version suitable for personal computers, and a...
"Leopard" includes an application called Dashcode
Dashcode
Dashcode is a software application created by Apple Inc. that is included with Mac OS X Leopard and facilitates the development of widgets for Dashboard...
, which is a more user-friendly way of creating widgets. Another new feature of Mac OS X Leopard is called "Web Clips" which lets users easily create widgets from parts of a webpage. During the WWDC 2007 keynote, Steve Jobs made widgets out of the following: the featured news headlines on Yahoo.com
Yahoo!
Yahoo! Inc. is an American multinational internet corporation headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, United States. The company is perhaps best known for its web portal, search engine , Yahoo! Directory, Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Groups, Yahoo! Answers, advertising, online mapping ,...
, the top ten most searched terms on Google
Google
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...
, the Photo of the Day on National Geographic, the Dilbert
Dilbert
Dilbert is an American comic strip written and drawn by Scott Adams. First published on April 16, 1989, Dilbert is known for its satirical office humor about a white-collar, micromanaged office featuring the engineer Dilbert as the title character...
comic strip, and the box office information from Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
. The user can also customize the border to further personalize the widgets.
Widget functions and capabilities
Dashboard widgets, like web pages, are capable of many different things, often to perform tasks that would be tedious or complicated for the user to access manually. One example is the GoogleGoogle
Google Inc. is an American multinational public corporation invested in Internet search, cloud computing, and advertising technologies. Google hosts and develops a number of Internet-based services and products, and generates profit primarily from advertising through its AdWords program...
Search widget, which simply opens up the user's browser and performs a Google search. Other widgets, like Wikipedia, grab the contents of web pages and display them within Dashboard. Some widgets can also serve as games, using Adobe Flash
Adobe Flash
Adobe Flash is a multimedia platform used to add animation, video, and interactivity to web pages. Flash is frequently used for advertisements, games and flash animations for broadcast...
(or another multimedia authoring program) to create games just as if they were in a browser. It is also possible for Mac users to create their own widgets using built-in software.
Graphics
Dashboard uses a variety of graphical effects for displaying, opening, and using widgets. For instance, a 3-D flip effect is used to simulate the widget flipping around, by clicking on a small i icon in the right bottom corner, the user can change the preferences on the reverse side; other effects include crossfading and scaling from icon to body (when opening widgets),a "spin cycle effect" when a widget is focused and the user presses Command-R or a suck-in effect when they are closed. On sufficiently powered Macs, widgets will produce a ripple effect when they are opened, like a leaf falling onto water.These effects can be taxing and superfluous, consuming CPU resources, but with the help of OS X’s Quartz Extreme and Core Image
Core Image
Core Image is a pixel-accurate, near-realtime, non-destructive image processing technology in Mac OS X. Implemented as part of the QuartzCore framework of Mac OS X 10.4 and later, Core Image provides a plugin-based architecture for applying filters and effects within the Quartz graphics rendering...
graphics architectures, sufficient computing power to render them in real time
Real-time computing
In computer science, real-time computing , or reactive computing, is the study of hardware and software systems that are subject to a "real-time constraint"— e.g. operational deadlines from event to system response. Real-time programs must guarantee response within strict time constraints...
is available. As with Exposé
Exposé (Mac OS X)
Exposé is a feature of the Mac OS X operating system. First previewed on 23 June 2003 at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference as a feature of the then forthcoming Mac OS X v10.3, Exposé allows a user to quickly locate an open window, or to hide all windows and show the desktop without the need...
, Front Row and the minimise effect, holding shift down while calling the Dashboard or opening the Dashboard menu bar will display the effect in slow motion
Slow motion
Slow motion is an effect in film-making whereby time appears to be slowed down. It was invented by the Austrian priest August Musger....
.
Comparison with Konfabulator
Many people have made comparisons between Konfabulator and Apple's Dashboard, especially after Apple announced the feature while Mac OS X v10.4Mac OS X v10.4
Mac OS X v10.4 Tiger is the fifth major release of Mac OS X, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers. Tiger was released to the public on 29 April 2005 for US$129.95 as the successor to Mac OS X Panther , which had been released 18 months earlier...
was in development. It was a subject of debate in the online community following the few months before Mac OS X Tiger's official release.
One school of thought came to the conclusion that Dashboard was a "rip-off" of Konfabulator. It points out the visual and functional similarities between Dashboard has been widely compared to Konfabulator (now Yahoo! Widget Engine
Yahoo! Widget Engine
Yahoo! Widgets is a free application platform for Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows. The software was previously called Konfabulator, but after being acquired by computer services company Yahoo! it was rebranded. The name Konfabulator was subsequently reinstated as the name of the underlying rendering...
) and sometimes called a copy of it, due to the similarities between their graphical aspects and the fact that they both use the term “widgets” to describe the objects in their environments. Konfabulator may in turn have been based on Apple’s Desk Accessories
Desk Accessory
A desk accessory is a small helper-type application that can be run concurrently with any other application on the system. Early examples, such as SideKick and Macintosh desk accessories, used special programming models to provide a small degree of multitasking on a system that initially did not...
, first released in 1984 with the original Macintosh. Desk Accessories, similar to widgets, were small mini-applications that operated on a user’s desktop. After the introduction of System 7
System 7 (Macintosh)
System 7 is a single-user graphical user interface-based operating system for Macintosh computers. It was introduced on May 13, 1991 by Apple Computer. It succeeded System 6, and was the main Macintosh operating system until it was succeeded by Mac OS 8 in 1997...
and cooperative multitasking, the necessity of creating Desk Accessories was removed and developers were encouraged to create applications instead. The OS continued to support them, for backward compatibility, until the switch to Mac OS X
Mac OS X
Mac OS X is a series of Unix-based operating systems and graphical user interfaces developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc. Since 2002, has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems...
(In fact, the Calculator desk accessory remained in the Mac OS through version 9, 17 years without a significant update).
The code bases for Konfabulator and Dashboard are also different: Konfabulator uses XML
XML
Extensible Markup Language is a set of rules for encoding documents in machine-readable form. It is defined in the XML 1.0 Specification produced by the W3C, and several other related specifications, all gratis open standards....
and JavaScript
JavaScript
JavaScript is a prototype-based scripting language that is dynamic, weakly typed and has first-class functions. It is a multi-paradigm language, supporting object-oriented, imperative, and functional programming styles....
to generate Widgets, whereas Dashboard uses HTML
HTML
HyperText Markup Language is the predominant markup language for web pages. HTML elements are the basic building-blocks of webpages....
, CSS
CSS
-Computing:*Cascading Style Sheets, a language used to describe the style of document presentations in web development*Central Structure Store in the PHIGS 3D API*Closed source software, software that is not distributed with source code...
, JavaScript, and Objective-C
Objective-C
Objective-C is a reflective, object-oriented programming language that adds Smalltalk-style messaging to the C programming language.Today, it is used primarily on Apple's Mac OS X and iOS: two environments derived from the OpenStep standard, though not compliant with it...
.
Included widgets
In the first version of DashBoard released with Mac OS X v10.4 - v10.4.3Mac OS X v10.4
Mac OS X v10.4 Tiger is the fifth major release of Mac OS X, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers. Tiger was released to the public on 29 April 2005 for US$129.95 as the successor to Mac OS X Panther , which had been released 18 months earlier...
, Apple included 14 widgets with it. They consisted of:
- Address Book (application)
- Business
- Calculator
- Calendar
- DictionaryDictionary (software)Dictionary is an application developed by Apple for its Macintosh computers. It was introduced with Mac OS X v10.4 "Tiger", and provides definitions and synonyms from the New Oxford American Dictionary, 2nd Edition and Oxford American Writer's Thesaurus, 2nd Edition...
- Flight Tracker
- iTunesITunesiTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....
Controller - Phone Book
- Stickies
- Stocks
- Tile Game
- Translation
- Unit Converter
- Weather
- World Clock
After the Macworld 2006 keynote, Steve Jobs
Steve Jobs
Steven Paul Jobs was an American businessman and inventor widely recognized as a charismatic pioneer of the personal computer revolution. He was co-founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of Apple Inc...
also announced four new widgets (Ski Report, People Finder, Google Search, and ESPN), as well as significant updates to the Phone Book and Calendar widgets. All of these are available through the Mac OS X v10.4.4 update.
In addition, Mac OS X v10.5
Mac OS X v10.5
Mac OS X Leopard is the sixth major release of Mac OS X, Apple's desktop and server operating system for Macintosh computers. Leopard was released on 26 October 2007 as the successor of Tiger , and is available in two variants: a desktop version suitable for personal computers, and a...
"Leopard" released in late 2007, includes new widgets. One of these is Web Clips, which allows any user to turn a rectangular section of any webpage into a widget (This, however, only works with Safari
Safari (web browser)
Safari is a web browser developed by Apple Inc. and included with the Mac OS X and iOS operating systems. First released as a public beta on January 7, 2003 on the company's Mac OS X operating system, it became Apple's default browser beginning with Mac OS X v10.3 "Panther". Safari is also the...
). The widget updates as the website does, and all links and other interactive material in the widget's selection of the webpage works as if the website is being accessed from Safari. Another new widget is Movies, which allows users to find currently playing movies at local theaters, view trailers, and purchase tickets directly from Dashboard.
Widgets on the desktop
To keep one or more widgets on the desktop, the Dashboard "devmode" must be activated. Enter the following into the Terminal:defaults write com.apple.dashboard devmode YES
and then restart the Dock (and Dashboard):
killall -HUP Dock
After the devmode has been set, widgets dragged from the Dashboard will remain floating on the desktop, even after log out or shutdown. With the Dashboard active, begin dragging a widget. While dragging the widget, press the keyboard key assigned to toggling Dashboard mode to close the dashboard. The widget will remain active and can be positioned. To move a desktop widget back to the Dashboard, simply reverse the process used to move it onto the desktop: drag the widget, then press the key to activate the Dashboard.
Another feature of the "devmode" is the ability to restart individual widgets. Pressing the Command-R keys will restart the active widget. This works whether a widget is in the Dashboard or not.
Another option is to use Amnesty Singles or Amnesty Widget Browser, shareware utilities that also allow the user to select which level (desktop, standard or floating) a widget occupies while it resides on the desktop. WidgetRunner is an open-source, freeware utility that also allows you to run widgets on the desktop and control the level at which they appear.
Widgets on the iOS
Apple has not, as of 2011, announced support for the installation of Dashboard widgets on the iOS. Even though, in June 2008, an unannounced update of Dashcode that was packaged with the iPhone SDK allowed for the creation of iPhone-oriented web widgetWeb widget
In computing a web widget is a software widget for the web. It's a small application that can be installed and executed within a web page by an end user. They are derived from the idea of code reuse. Other terms used to describe web widgets include: portlet, gadget, badge, module, webjit, capsule,...
s, it is unknown if this most recent version of Dashcode would support the creation of AJAX-driven mobile widgets that could be installed natively on the iOS.
It has been demonstrated by Erica Sadun that installing Dashboard widgets on a jailbroken
Privilege escalation
Privilege escalation is the act of exploiting a bug, design flaw or configuration oversight in an operating system or software application to gain elevated access to resources that are normally protected from an application or user...
iOS is possible in theory, but most desktop-oriented widgets 1) are not oriented to usage or interaction on the iOS's multi-touch
Multi-touch
In computing, multi-touch refers to a touch sensing surface's ability to recognize the presence of two or more points of contact with the surface...
screen
Touchscreen
A touchscreen is an electronic visual display that can detect the presence and location of a touch within the display area. The term generally refers to touching the display of the device with a finger or hand. Touchscreens can also sense other passive objects, such as a stylus...
-oriented interface; and 2) rely on DashboardClient's widget JavaScript object, which is not part of the iOS.